OCTOBER 15
On this date, the world said good riddance to Margaretha Geertruida Zelle and welcomed Lucille Désirée Ball into their TV homes.
Mata Hari was executed by a firing squad consisting of 12 French soldiers just before dawn on 15 October 1917. She was 41. According to an eyewitness account by British reporter Henry Wales, she was not bound and refused a blindfold. She defiantly blew a kiss to the firing squad.